Pond with no liner?

[Brian B]

Hey all,

I am looking to move to another state, where I may have the opportunity to have acreage.

Years ago, I rented a barn house in the country that had a big (maybe 2000 gallon) bathtub shaped hole in the ground. Roommate and I turned it into a pond just by filling it with water and goldfish.
Cattails were already present, the hole was always partially filled due to rain and irrigation from the surrounding hay fields. We kept it completely filled manually. Water would seep into the surrounding lawn, (keeping it green) but the water loss wasn't too bad.

Now to my question - is there any reason I shouldn't explore digging a pond without a liner? That natural pond required very little maintenance. Once a year we would wade in and pull out the cattails, but other than topping it off here and there....we didn't have to deal with algae at all.
Occasionally we would wade in and dig out some mud to use in our garden bed. It was nice.

Thanks for your input.

 

[MitchM]

Brian, you might want to look into creating a pond with a sodium bentonite clay liner.
Bentonite clay has unique molecular properties that allow it to be incorporated into the top few inches of soil where once it becomes wet, it provides a waterproof barrier that will retain water.
There is a method you can use to calculate how much bentonite clay you need per sq ft, depending on your own soil conditions.
I'll try to find it for you if you're interested.
I'm in the process of converting my own former epdm liner pond into a bentonite layered pond.

 

[Brian B]

Brian, you might want to look into creating a pond with a sodium bentonite clay liner.
Bentonite clay has unique molecular properties that allow it to be incorporated into the top few inches of soil where once it becomes wet, it provides a waterproof barrier that will retain water.
There is a method you can use to calculate how much bentonite clay you need per sq ft, depending on your own soil conditions.
I'll try to find it for you if you're interested.
I'm in the process of converting my own former epdm liner pond into a bentonite layered pond.

Thank you. That looks like something to consider.

 

[MitchM]

Great, while you're looking into it, be sure to use sodium bentonite. Calcium bentonite is also available, but does not have the same water retention ability.